By Elton Tucker, Assistant Sport EditorSEVERAL local-based members of Jamaica's delegation to the Games of the XXIII Olympiad in Athens will leave the island tonight.
The first batch of officials and athletes will be headed by manager of the track and field team Lincoln Eatmon and his assistant Ian Forbes. Also down to leave tonight is teenage sensation Usain Bolt, Kerron Stewart, a member of the women's sprint relay squad and track and field coaches Dennis Johnson (head coach), Glen Mills, Fitz Coleman, Maurice Wilson, Maurice Westney and Raymond Graham.
Bolt has been out of competition since April with a hamstring injury but was given the go-ahead over the weekend to compete at the August 13-29 Games.
Stephen Francis, a member of the coaching staff for the Games, is already in Europe with several of his charges including new Olympic 100 metres favourite Asafa Powell, Sherone Simpson who will run the women's 100m in Athens and 100m sprint hurdler Brigitte Foster.
The track and field contingent will travel to London and Munich enroute to Nuremburg in Germany for a seven-day pre-Olympic camp before arriving in Athens.
Chef de Mission Don Anderson will be the first member of Jamaica's delegation in Athens. Anderson is scheduled to fly to the Greek capital on Wednesday where he will make final preparations for the entry of Jamaica's 78-strong contingent into the Games village.
COMPETITORS LEAVE
Swimmers Janelle Atkinson, Angella Chuck, Alia Atkinson and Jevon Atkinson, along with manager John Eyre and coach Jacqueline Walter will leave for Athens on Friday along with badminton manager/coach Kingsley Ford.
Nigella Saunders, the first badminton player to represent Jamaica at the Olympics, is based in Denmark where she is on an Olympic Solidarity scholarship.
Last Thursday, Jamaica Olympic Association president, Mike Fennell, said he expected the swimmers and Saunders who has risen to 26th in the world in the women's singles to do fairly well in the Games.
"It will be difficult for them (the swimmers) to reach the medal rounds but they have prepared themselves very well for the Games," Fennell said at the press briefing to officially announce Jamaica's contingent for Athens.
STRONG IN SPRINTS
Speaking at the same function, track and field manager Eatmon said Jamaica was 'very strong in the sprints, men's and women's 4x100m, men's 4x400m, men's 400m hurdles and women's sprint hurdles' and he expected a good showing at the Games. Eatmon was assistant to Winston Ulett at the last Games in Sydney.
In addition to the team of competitors, Jamaica will be represented at the Olympic Youth Camp in Athens by teenagers Gillian Millwood of Campion College and Vishwanauth Tolan of Calabar High.
The two teenagers will serve as cultural ambassadors for the island at the August 11-26 camp. All National Olympic Com-mittees (NOC) were invited to send two representatives to the camp.
Millwood and Tolan were selected from a group of 14 named by local sporting associations. Olympian Vilma Charlton, JOA member Jimmy Carnegie and president of the Inter-Secondary Schools Sports Association (ISSA), Clement Radcliffe, were the members of the selection committee.
